Photos, Stories and Scrapbooking

I used to have a picture book about daylilies; I can’t find it now. But I remember that’s where I found a Hemerocallis variety that would grow in Southern California. After moving to Nebraska, I found another variety, Happy Day, this one with sunny yellow blooms. They only last a day, but they contrast beautifully with the blue Balloon Flowers and Rozanne Geraniums that I planted next to them in my garden.

I would like to add a second side to this page for my flower book. Unfortunately, July is past the peak bloom for my daylilies to look their best. So I am going to save this layout so that I can add to it later.

I often use templates to create my pages. This page is based on Artsy Layered Template No. 253. I may change or delete layers, even move parts, but for me they provide an good starting point for an artsy page. After dragging over all the layers of template 253, I turned off all but the small frames and text box. In place of the mask included in the template, I placed png mask 4 from Hipster Plume FotoBlendz No. 8. I chose this mask because the shape was similar to transfer 8 from ArtPlay Palette Abrazo that I wanted to use for this layout.

Next, I layered additional photo copies as well as copies transfer 8 from ArtPlay Palette Abrazo. First I blended in a layer with just one flower from my photo on darken blend mode at 70%. Second, a copy of transfer 8 on pin light blend mode at 100%. Third, I blended in part of the photo to show through part of the transfer.

Above that I placed another copy of the transfer on normal blend mode at 100% and added a layer mask to hide parts of the transfer so that the photo showed through. Finally, I added one more copy of the photo, attached an inverted mask and blended back enough to fill the suggested frame in the transfer.

At this point I turned back on several template layers, recolored some, adjusted positions in the layers panel and changed the blend mode of others. My goal was to ensure that the texture showed through the photo layers. I also placed solid paper 2 from ArtPlay Palette Abrazo.

Once I finished working with the photo and template layers, I wrote my journaling, added a mini cluster with a button and thread from UrbanThreadz No. 14 to anchor the small frames, placed a title and two more buttons to create a visual triangle.

Yes, I think starting with a template makes creating an artsy page much easier. Once you place the layers of a template, then it’s a matter of playing with placement of layers, blending and blend modes to create the look you want. Try experimenting with multiple copies of a photo and transfer by changing blend modes and revealing parts with layer masks.